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Jure Pečar | 11 Oct 2006 12:00
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stabilty & reliability


Hello,

maybe not so much an ecasound question (can you direct me to a more apropriate mailing list for this?) ... 

My current setup:

linux 2.6.16-rt16 smp
2x delta 1010LT
alsa 1.0.11
jackd version 0.101.0 with mmap_complex-patch-0.100.7
ecasound-2.4.4

Back in April I was asking how to put it all together to work, now I'm asking how to make it work reliably.

The job of this machine is to record various radio stations on its inputs. I wrote some scripts for that to be
remotely controllable by external process and this part works ok. However, the wav files that come out are not.

Most of the recordings are ok. Then, some terminate prematurely. Some are even less than a second long. Some
are not even parsable by audacity (shows no signal). 

I put some logging into my scripts and found all sorts of weird stuff: ecasound segfaulting, jackd
misteriously going away, jackd not wanting to accept any clients, etc ... I worked around some of these
with the help of google, but I'm still not satisfied. I would really like this setup to perform 100%.

So, question for all that are doing similiar multichannel recordings ... what combination of kernel - rt
patch - alsa - jack - ecasound works 100% ok for you? How much is smp an issue with rt? Should I try non-smp kernel?

Thanks for answers,
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John Rigg | 11 Oct 2006 19:49
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Re: stabilty & reliability

On Wed, Oct 11, 2006 at 12:00:41PM +0200, Jure Pe??ar wrote:
> My current setup:
> 
> linux 2.6.16-rt16 smp
> 2x delta 1010LT
> alsa 1.0.11
> jackd version 0.101.0 with mmap_complex-patch-0.100.7
> ecasound-2.4.4
> 
> So, question for all that are doing similiar multichannel recordings ... what combination of kernel - rt
patch - alsa - jack - ecasound works 100% ok for you? How much is smp an issue with rt? Should I try non-smp kernel?

Are you using x86_64? There are lots of issues here. I'm using
3 x Delta 1010 with a dual Opteron. I've never been able to get -rt
kernels to work with this setup. ALSA pcm_multi causes problems for -rt
and locks up my system as soon as I start jackd. I use vanilla SMP kernel
with CONFIG_PREEMPT=y. This works well.

Another problem is pcm_multi doesn't work with jackd in duplex mode
after alsa-lib-1.0.8. There's a patch here (tested with alsa-lib 1.0.9
through 1.0.12):

http://www.sound-man.co.uk/linuxaudio/pcm_multi-patch

Another (x86_64 specific) problem is that jackd 0.101.0 and earlier
generates a spurious divide-by-zero error at seemingly random times that
kills jackd. Sometimes it runs for hours before it happens, sometimes
only a few seconds. A floating point exception message from jackd
appears on the console, and a divide trap error message from the kernel
appears in syslog when it occurs.
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Jure Pečar | 12 Oct 2006 11:21
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Re: stabilty & reliability

On Wed, 11 Oct 2006 12:00:41 +0200
Jure Pečar <pegasus <at> nerv.eu.org> wrote:

> I put some logging into my scripts and found all sorts of weird stuff:

Some examples of what I'm seeing on stderr from various recording threads:

could not attach as client
jack server not running?
could not attach as client
jack server not running?

\ this happens when jackd is dead before the start of the recording script. I worked around that by checking
if it is alive and restarting it if necessary.

--

-- 

cannot connect ports
cannot connect ports

\ this happens when jackd does not want to connect any client. I figured out it has something to do with shared
memory segments not beeing freed and googled a command to check for them and delete them.

--

zombified - calling shutdown handler
cannot send request type 2 to server
cannot read result for request type 2 from server (Broken pipe)
cannot send request type 2 to server
cannot read result for request type 2 from server (Broken pipe)
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Jure Pečar | 13 Oct 2006 02:21
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Re: stabilty & reliability

On Wed, 11 Oct 2006 18:49:43 +0100
John Rigg <eca <at> sound-man.co.uk> wrote:

> I've been recording for around 5 months using the patches and workarounds
> described above, with excellent results and reliability.

Sorry, I've somehow managed to miss your first mail ...

No, I don't have a 64bit machine. It's a plain "old" dual xeon rack server. Also, I'm doing recording only, so
no duplex here. I'm surely going to dig about that alsa pcm_multi interaction with realtime kernels to see
if I come up with anything similiar to what I'm seeing ...

You say that realtime kernel patch is not strictly necessary for multichannel recordings? That would
certainly simplify some things ...

Also, your site was a great help for putting things together. Keep up the good work!

--

-- 

Jure Pečar
http://jure.pecar.org/

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John Rigg | 13 Oct 2006 10:18
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Re: stabilty & reliability

On Fri, Oct 13, 2006 at 02:21:06AM +0200, Jure Pe??ar wrote:
> You say that realtime kernel patch is not strictly necessary for multichannel recordings? That would
certainly simplify some things ...

If you are just recording and not doing anything that needs very low
latency (like MIDI), then a non-rt SMP kernel should work well.
In fact the -rt patch makes use of some of the kernel's SMP facilities
and applies them to single CPUs, so if you have real SMP to start with
you're most of the way there.

John

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Kai Vehmanen | 19 Oct 2006 23:59

working towards 2.4.5

Hello everyone,

as it's been such a long time since last release, I thought it's good time 
to have a quick status update. In short, I've been personally tied up with 
other projects, and I've not had sufficient time to concentrate on 2.4.5. 
Though late, the release is still on its way. To see what's already 
changed/added since the 2.4.4 release, check:

  * http://eca.cx/ecasound/history.php

There're a few severe bugs that I'd want to address before the release:

  * cleaning up forked encoder/decoders (-> problems about both
    output files missing some bits from the end, and OTOH, of
    forked processes left running)
      - this is tricky as some encoder/decoders do not handle
        signals properly, so you basicly need to find a good compromise
      - reported at least by Florian Ladstaedter
  * the "rw 0" problem reported by hardware <at> ee.ccn<hidden>
  * incorrect return values in interactive mode as reported
    by Zrajm C Akfohg

Then there are some bugs I'd wish to address but which I've already 
postponed to 2.4.6:

  * segfault related to generic linear envelopes (reported by Jan Lana)
  * possible copy_range bug in ewf (reported by Eric Rzewnicki)
  * ecasound and duplicate LADSPA plugins (Paul coccolini)
  * ECI parser buffer overflows (Stuart Allie)
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Julien Claassen | 22 Oct 2006 23:17
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Re: stabilty & reliability

Hi!
  First of all: You should try the linux-audio-user list, there should be a 
lot of people, who can help you with specific issues. Just give exact reports 
and they'll most certainly help you as good as they can, which is usually very 
good.
  Then I use Kernel 2.6.16, with the internal alsa-version and jackd-0.100.7 
(I believe) and it works fine. I start jack like this (with my one delta 
1010lt)
  jackd -R -d alsa -d hw:0 -r 48000 -H -M -p 128 -z shaped
  And it runs fine, with only a few VERY SHORT xruns, I usually can't hear.
  Hope that helps and try linux-audio-user's list, they're great!
  Kindest regards
        Julien

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Julien Claassen | 31 Oct 2006 11:18
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Plea for a feature

Hello!
  Just recently I discovered, that there is an old wish still unfullfilled. 
Kai could you implement another time-measuring in ecasound. Measured in beats 
and/or bars relative to a specific tempo in bpm?
  Something like: -t:120,8 - meaning 120 bpm and 8 beats. I just ask, because 
sometimes I have very nasty tempos and it's a bit annoying to compute the 
absolute time, when I wish to cut something.
  Kindest regards
            Julien

--------
Music was my first love and it will be my last (John Miles)

======== FIND MY WEB-PROJECT AT: ========
http://ltsb.sourceforge.net
the Linux TextBased Studio guide
======= AND MY PERSONAL PAGES AT: =======
http://www.juliencoder.de

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